The Bailey-Matthews National Shell Museum & Aquarium concludes its summer-fall online lecture series with \u201cPicking Up the Pieces: Tracking Elusive Predators on Mollusks\u201d on Wednesday, Oct. 14, at 5:30 p.m.<\/p>\n
The online lecture, led by Matthew Ajemian, Ph.D., will be offered live via Zoom and is free for registrants.<\/p>\n
The elusive nature of large, shell-crushing predators (such as rays and sea turtles) creates challenges to the understanding of the ecological role of these predators in seabed communities, including how they interact with molluscan shellfish.<\/p>\n
This talk covers how Ajemian\u2019s team uses innovative methods such as shell fragmentation, eDNA, and acoustics to detect and study predator-prey interactions (a \u201cwho crushed who?\u201d) within various underwater habitats and conditions. <\/p>\n
Attendees will experience how Ajemian\u2019s team uses specialized tags to track the foraging behavior of a large predator, the whitespotted eagle ray, in Bermuda and Florida. <\/p>\n
The talk closes with a discussion of the relevance of these findings to marine ecosystem ecology and shellfish restoration projects in Florida and beyond.<\/p>\n
Ajemian is an associate research professor at Florida Atlantic University (FAU) where he leads the Fisheries Ecology and Conservation program at FAU Harbor Branch. <\/p>\n
He has published more than 80 articles and has received competitive early-career awards from the National Academy of Sciences and the National Science Foundation, as well as applied grants from NOAA Fisheries, the Department of Defense, and Florida Sea Grant.<\/p>\n
Although free of charge, pre-registration is required. <\/p>\n